You have to wonder, don't
you? I mean, all lemmings do
is wander around the
countryside, eating grass,
chatting to the neighbours and
excreting every so often. Then they decide
that Iife's not worth it and promptly chuck
themselves off the nearest deadly
precipice. Not exactly a cast-iron
philosophy on which to build a community
is it?
I mean, imagine if early cavemen had gone and topped
themselves every time a dinosaur trampled on their
broccoli, or taken a nibble of a deadly mushroom
because Zog next door was playing his bonging rock
all night when you had an awful headache from too
much woad. We wouldn't be here today if early man
had been that depressed. All of which begs one
teensy-weensy question: how the flip did lemmings
make it this far down the evolutionary scale?
Psygnosis would have us believe that they made it
this far so that they could be immortalised in a
revolutionary platform game. In fact they're so sure of
this hitherto unknown fact that they've given you,
gentle Spec-chum, the role of chief protector of
lemmings, a kind of zoo-keeper on a Hippocratic oath.
You see, the whole point of lemmings is to guide
wodges of the hairy cuddlesome chaps to the end of a
level, by directing them in all sorts of groovy but ever
so important functions.

Take a trip down lemming lane...
If you don't tell the lemmings what to do, then they'll
easily find some way of killing themselves This is
because, as we've already ascertained, they think that
it's both smart and clever. Right, so the lemmings drop
down from the sky and you've got to keep them safe.
At the bottom of the screen are 12 icons Eight of
these enable you to direct a single lemming in a task
For example, if there's a huge wall in the way you can
click on one of them and he'll burrow through it.
Similarly, if there's a gap that needs crossing, you can
kit one out with a Masters degree in bridge building and
set him off to the other side. YTS was never like this.
The other four icons at the bottom of the screen
control the speed of the arrival of the lemmings from a
hole in the ceiling, a pause key and an Armageddon
button which annihilates all the lemmings if you've
really mucked up a level.

Sounds a bit too easy to me!
Of course, nothing's ever
as easy as all that. No
siree, in this game, the 60
levels vary from piddlingly
easy to aggravatingly hard.
All sorts of obstacles get
plonked in your way, such
as drops that are just too
high to leap off, spinning
scythes and volcanic pits.
Fail to work out what you're
meant to do with your
lemmings and the little
chaps will just stroll off to
their deaths. On some
levels you'll have to
account for each and every
lemming dropped from the
sky; while on others, you'll
only have to get a couple
home safely.
Graphically, each level is monochrome. This isn't a
problem, because you can still see the lemmings
perfectly adequately, complete with flowing locks of
hair and pained expressions when you decide to blow
them up. The bottom icon display is in a different
colour, which means you can quickly pick out a task for
each rodent. The cursor which itemises our heroes is
about the same size as a lemming and can be locked
onto a particular lem by hitting N. This makes life a
whole lot easier.
Nope, there's little doubt about it. Lemmings is a
corker and no mistake. The levels have been perfectly
weighted to help progression through the game and
believe me, you will want to progress. Once these
pixelated fur-balls are let loose on your Speccy, they
won't let go until you've saved them from each and
every one of the 60 levels. So be prepared, there's no
sleep until lemming bedtime.

Digging lemming, climbing lemming, what about a:

Prime Minister Lemming: let's face it, the chap who's currently ensconced in number 10 Downing Street [John Major - NickH] has
got all the charm of a rodent anyway. It'd certainly bring a whole new meaning to the term political suicide.
Stunt Person Lemming: easy to work out why these chaps would make such good stunt peeps, the film crew
wouldn't have to worry about safety precautions or gorey special effects, they could simply tell the lemmings
to leap off a building and film the whole thing.
Rock Star Lemming: particularly apt one this. Y'see, rock singers like nothing better than diving off tall stacks
of amplification equipment into the audience. What
easier job could there be for a slam dancing rodent?
Comedian Lemming: as rodents can't speak to
humans, the act could consist entirely of the
lemming sitting on a stool looking bemused. When
the audience refuses to laugh, it could leap into the
tuba player's instrument, get blown up into the
balcony and from there do a graceful swallow dive
onto a large lady's hat.
Water Divining Lemming: the lemming could stroll
around fields with a couple of pieces of wire bent at
right angles. The twist being that the lemming would
discover the water by plopping into it. This is a far
more accurate method of water diving than
expecting two silly pieces of bent wire to know H2O
when they feel it. Hurumph!

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